Saturday Video Update

Labels: family, friends, reading, school, spiritual seeking

posted by Miss Rachel 5/10/2008 07:54:00 PM

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Thursday Night Update

Labels: friends, school, work

posted by Miss Rachel 3/07/2008 06:25:00 AM

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It's My Birthday!



Listening: Jacob Ter Veldhuis - Paradiso Oratorio

Labels: family, friends, listening

posted by Miss Rachel 2/24/2008 09:05:00 PM

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Me and School and a Dog Named Blue

Labels: Blue, friends, library science, school

posted by Miss Rachel 2/17/2008 11:11:00 PM

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Long Overdue Update

Labels: blogging, family, friends, school, watching

posted by Miss Rachel 1/22/2008 08:41:00 PM

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You know, I just don't have enough in my sidebar so now I've gone and added voice comments. I would love if you would leave me one. You have to create an account on Snapvine, but it's pretty easy (I mean, I did it) and it's free. And if you don't, you may still hear my happy little greeting here on the page. Do I sound like you thought I would? When I hear my voice, I always think it sounds much more... I don't know... nasally (?) than it does if you're inside my head. It sounds much lower and smarter inside my head. Anyway, I'd love to hear from you.

Did everyone have a nice Christmas? I totally did. I went on this cleaning bonanza the weekend before, finishing it off the morning of the 24th. I also had to go and get another present for my mom that day too, but other than that there was no exceptional stress. I didn't bake or cook anything and I didn't send Christmas cards this year. I decided that doing those things would only add to the holiday by making me crazier instead of making me more joyous.

My mom and sister came down on the 24th, but they went directly to Andrea's friend's house (where they were having dinner) without stopping here first so Sweetie and I didn't see them until we got home from the dinner we had at his sister's house. At his sister's house, there was her and her husband and their two kids, his other sister and her husband and their two kids, plus Sweetie's parents and the two of us. One of his sister's kids is getting to be just the age I love - 7 years old. And she and I were exchanging glances and smiling at each other about some of the crazy things one of the little ones was saying. Cute.

I got to spend some quality time with my mom and Andrea later that night and we were together all day on Christmas. (By the way Mom and Andrea said, "Who cleaned the house? It's immaculate!") Our Christmas day dinner included me, Sweetie, my mom, my sister and Sweetie's parent at an Asian fusion restaurant. There were some issues with the food there - cold plates and some of the dishes not quite hot enough. Sweetie and I go to this restaurant a lot for take out, and it seems better at serving that than serving in house, especially for people like my mom and Sweetie's parents who like their food HOT. But it was still a good time because we always have fun talking and telling stories with Sweetie's parents.

After we got back from dinner, I called GG (my friend from work) to wish him a merry Christmas. He answered the phone "Upsot?!" a reference to Barbra Streisand's version of Jingle Bells that we joke about, when he saw it was me calling. Then we chatted a bit about what we had been doing. I was glad I made an effort to call him because he sounded really happy to hear from me. I'm glad we're friends.

Well, as you can see what I really like about holidays is time with loved ones. I hope everyone else in Blog Land had a nice time too.

Labels: blogging, family, friends, holidays

posted by Miss Rachel 12/30/2007 08:20:00 PM

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Driving up to school today, I was about to pass a truck, and I started reading its bumper stickers: Question Authority. Anyone but Joe. Heavily Armed Liberal Democrat. And on the side of it: I don't suffer from mental illness. I enjoy every minute of it. As I passed the truck, I caught the driver's eye, smiled and gave him the thumbs up signal and he did the same.

I feel as if I've been really busy, but I have not been working on school. Now I am faced with the memo project due next Saturday. It's not started yet. Nope. I had all week to work on it, but I didn't. Oh well. I got my tutorial back today. The teacher gives a page back with your paper all about how he came up with your grade. I believe it's called a "rubric." I thought his comments and criticism were valid. I got a B+, and I'm satisfied with that.

I go up and down with how I feel about school. Sometimes I feel disappointed in myself for not working harder and doing better. Other times I feel overjoyed that I am doing this. Today as I was heading to the library to get some coffee and meet with "my girls" before class two of my other classmates passed me and said, "Hey, where are you going? Aren't you a little early?" (They were heading away from campus.) And I said, "I'm going to the library to get some caw-fee." And they were smiling so warmly and I just felt so glad to be a part of this program and to get to meet these cool, interesting people. Don't ever let anyone tell you that librarians are boring.

Labels: friends, school, the world around us

posted by Miss Rachel 12/08/2007 10:04:00 PM

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The weekend was really busy so I didn't get a lot of the down time I so badly crave. Our plumber came to fix the bathtub drain on Saturday morning. (It was seriously clogged.) And then Sweetie and I had a number of errands to do during the day. I also baked cookies to bring to the party that night.

Then there was the party which was fun, but tiring. Also, we didn't know that many people so some of the time we were just standing or sitting around observing and listening. Our friends have a little dog that they adopted recently, but he is certainly NOT like Blue about visitors. There were tons of people there and he was darting all over the place and wagging his tail.

Sunday was the day we had scheduled to install the clothesline I bought. Our brother-in-law (Sweetie's sister's husband) agreed to help us do it in exchange for pizza and beer. I ended up not really helping, except for bringing our brother-in-law a beer, and just hung with my sister-in-law and her kids (one baby and one 4 (?) year old). Blue barked a lot had to spend most of the time in the crate because he has a tendency to nip at visitors' heels if they walk around. (He is getting better with my friend Writer who has been here a number of times though.) I had fun playing with my little niece. Oddly enough, when she and I were running around the house making growling sounds at each other, Blue didn't bark at all.

After the clothesline was installed, we all went out for pizza. I had a nice time and was also really glad to have the clothesline in. I used it that afternoon, and the laundry dried really fast and had that nice, crisp texture and fresh smell that you can only get from drying things outdoors in the sunshine.

Labels: dogs, family, friends, life at home

posted by Miss Rachel 8/14/2007 08:33:00 PM

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It feels as if most of my time these days is spent working, exercising and reading (online and off), but today I went up to visit my friend Mary in Massachusetts. The original plan was to have lunch and then go for a swim in her pool, but today dawned rainy and downright cold for August so we didn't do the pool part.

Her boyfriend, K, had the day off today so the three of us headed out to a Greek restaurant for lunch. They're both pretty heavy and they're currently dieting doing Nutri system, but that's one of those diets where you have to eat mostly packaged food so they weren't following it at the restaurant. Mary spoke a bit of the thrill of eating "bad" food (i.e. she had some white bread with butter and we all shared an order of onion rings). I don't like to refer to foods as good and bad, but I didn't let it bother me.

Some time during lunch pot smoking came up. Turns out, K had some and asked if I liked it, and I said yes I did. In fact, I said, "I LOVE that stuff." I used to be a total pot head, but now I hardly ever smoke. The last time I had some I think was in 2004. Although I'm glad I don't smoke regularly anymore, I was definitely up for it today.

After lunch we drove around for a while looking at all the cool old houses in the area and then we headed back to their house. Their house is a gorgeous old Victorian, but the inside of it is a chaos of boxes and boxes full of stuff with more stuff on top of that and so on. We eventually cleared some space on the couch and sat down to watch some TV and have a little smoke. They have Tivo and Mary suggested we watch this show from a series they had taped from VH-1 about drugs in America.

The show was good, but K would pause it occasionally and we'd all talk for a while. Mary is a total bird freak and she kept exclaiming about the "cute" birds that were out at the feeders they had. I have to say the birds were pretty impressive - there were lots of gold finches, some cardinals and even a couple of woodpeckers. Fascinating to see all those since most of what I see at my feeder is house sparrows and starlings and other "dull" colored birds.

After we finished watching the first installment of the drugs series, we watched a clip from the Onion and then the starting of Big Love. I had mentioned I used to watch Dr. Who a long time ago on public TV when I lived in Vermont and K said there were new episodes on now and wanted me to see some of it so we watched part of an episode. I would like to be able to start watching Dr Who again, and start from the beginning. I think there is tons of it though, and I'm not sure it's available on Netflix although I have seen some VHS tapes of it at the library.

I headed home a little after 6 and got home at 7. I gave Blue and Trinka some pets and gave Sweetie (who was out getting our order from Szechuan Tokyo when I first arrived) lots of hugs and kisses. Then we ate our food and watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was a good day.

Watching: Charlotte Gray (2001) staring Cate Blanchett, Billy Crudup and Michael Gambon. I've been wanting to see this movie for a while since it is about Vichy France which I didn't even know about until I took a European history class a few years ago. Although I enjoyed watching this movie (the acting, costumes and cinematography were excellent), the story didn't amount to much. I felt as if I had seen this before - there would be a shocking revelation (turns out Michael Gambon is part Jewish) and there would be redemption thanks to the courage of our plucky heroine. However, the redemption was very slight - she risks her life to type a letter? Roger Ebert's review sums it up well.

The West Wing, Season Three.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season Three.

Reading: Victory by Joseph Conrad. I finished this last weekend, and I feel a real sense of accomplishment since it was something I should have read back in high school, but never did until now. It's a bit dense, and there is definitely an ethnocentric perspective, but it was still a pretty good read.

The White Hotel by D.M. Thomas. Now I'm reading this. Very intriguing with lots of sex and death imagery.

Labels: friends, reading, watching

posted by Miss Rachel 8/10/2007 09:13:00 PM

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Getting ready for another Friday off tomorrow! Sweetie and I have a busy weekend planned: tomorrow I'm visiting with my friend Mary, Saturday we are going to a party and Sunday Sweetie's sister and her hubby (and kids probably) are coming over to help us install the clothesline I bought. We will finally be on our way to a "greener" way of living.

Labels: friends, life at home

posted by Miss Rachel 8/09/2007 08:52:00 PM

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It's hot hot hot. Must be one of the hottest days of the summer. Thank god that there is a breeze. I didn't do much today, except hang out on the internet and drink lots of water. I also talked to my mom, took a nap and read some more of Victory which I plan to finish this weekend. My friend Writer is coming over tonight to hang out and talk.

She's the person who got me to sign up for a MySpace account, and the she later deleted hers. I deleted mine after getting yet another request to be added as a friend to someone I had nothing in common with. No, I do not want to see your naked pictures. I just don't get MySpace, and I'm glad to be done with it.

Labels: friends, summer

posted by Miss Rachel 8/03/2007 07:10:00 PM

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I took yesterday off to read for school. The reading was slow going. Some of it was very dry and estoteric, featuring words like "empirical" and "paragdigm" numerous times - ugh. I didn't finish it all, and I don't think I retained what I did read very well so I hope the teacher doesn't ask me a question about something I didn't read / don't remember. I'm a bit anxious about this class, and I didn't sleep well last night. I had a lot of dreams about class last night, including one in which I left my house 20 minutes before class began. Since school is about 45 miles away, this would have been a problem. Anyway, it was just a bad dream.

In addition to reading for school, I went out to lunch with my old Work Friend who I haven't seen in like a year or two years. We went to Tapas and had a nice time catching up. Even though she and I haven't worked together for a few years, we still have a connection so it seems I've found a friend, and not just a "work friend." I even told her about being on antidepressants.

After lunch, I went to get a much-needed pedicure (!). I went to this spa / salon I've gone to before. I'm not crazy about all the foot filing and massaging (I'm ticklish) in most pedicures so I made an appointment for what they call a "mini pedicure." It focuses only on getting your nails in shape and then polishing them. The color I picked was an OPI one - I love their polish and the names for it. The color I picked is called "Don't Wine - Yukon Do It." It must have been from some Canadian collection they did. As you may, expect it's a purply, reddish wine color. I also thought the name was a good "mantra" for myself regarding my attitude about this class, "Don't whine; you can do it."

I better get going or else that bad dream I had last night will become a reality. Happy Saturday everyone.

Labels: friends, pedicure, school

posted by Miss Rachel 6/30/2007 06:40:00 AM

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There were a few students from my previous classes at the tech workshops on Saturday, and two others who I didn't know. The facilitator was this woman who is a bit flighty and disorganized, but I was able to get something out of the workshop anyway. One of the students who I didn't know seemed annoyed about this feature in databases called "Article Now." What you think that would mean is that you'd click it and the article would come up, but it doesn't work that way. You either have to click through a few other links or sometimes you are just given a message that the article is not available. Now you can see how this lack of functionality would be frustrating, but she seemed actually angry about it and kept mentioning it.

She struck me as a Complainer. You know the type. I do spend a fair amount of time here on my blog complaining, but I don't consider myself a Complainer. A Complainer is the type of person who is always focusing on whatever is wrong around her or in her life. There is someone at work with whom I'm friendly, and I used to go out to lunch with her occasionally, but after a while, it occurred to me that our lunch dates were bringing me down because all she did was complain, even if I tried to change the subject. Since I was always the person to suggest our lunch dates, I simply stopped, and we haven't gone out in a long time. Now we just chat occasionally in the office, and that seems to work better because I can usually get her to laugh about something. She does appreciate my sense of humor.

Labels: friends, school

posted by Miss Rachel 6/26/2007 07:16:00 PM

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What's Going On

We had friends over (!) for dinner last night. I made Cauliflower Curry from the Vegetarian Epicure cookbook. I served it with whole grain pita wedges and basmati and wild rice with chick peas in it. For dessert, I made vegan brownies which I served with vanilla Soy Dream and vegan chocolate chips. I also put out some Connecticut grown strawberries. Our friends brought a bottle of wine which we all drank. We had a nice time.

This morning I got up and watched the French Open. Kind of "blah" finals this year. It was pretty clear during each match that both Henin and Nadal had it in the bag. I watched another Poirot video. I'm now onto Disc 10.

Then Sweetie and I went to the cemeteries to check on the flowers. The impatiens at my dad's grave are doing great (the alyssum isn't but there isn't much of that anyway). I gave them some water and also checked out the footstone (not just a "marker") with his name, dates and the fact that he was a Corporal in the US Army during the Korean War. The footstone looks really nice. Too bad I forgot to bring my camera. We also went and found my great grandparents' grave.

Then we went to the Catholic cemetery to check out Nana's grave. The flowers there look all right so far. I gave them a lot of water and then pointed out another grave to Sweetie because it is planted really nicely AND because I was struck by the fact that two children predeceased the parents by quite a few years.

On the way back from the cemeteries Sweetie's car broke down. I called for help on my cell and then these two women came over and said they would help us push the car out of the road. They were so quick, and I was so blown away that I didn't help them at first (Sweetie was steering), but then I recovered my senses and ran over and joined the pushing. I think I said "thank you; that was so nice" about five times to them.

I had a really bad stomach ache all day, but it finally went away while we waited for the tow truck. Since we were in the parking lot of a Blockbuster, Sweetie went and got some trail mix and a lemonade. There was copy of the New Yorker in the car so I read part of an article about Manny Ramirez and part of an article on a Chinese political prisoner, Zha Jianguo.

We rode in the tow truck to the service station. Sweetie had already scheduled an appointment for an oil change there tomorrow anyway. Then the driver gave us a ride most of the way home, which was nice. We're only about 2 miles from the service station, but still he didn't have to go that way.

Now I'm going to go sit outside and drink a Reed's Extra Ginger Brew and read the rest of the article about the Zha Jianguo.

Labels: family, food, friends, life at home

posted by Miss Rachel 6/10/2007 05:09:00 PM

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To say I never go out would be incorrect, but it is rare for me to do so. Even the food Sweetie and I eat from local restaurants is most often take-out. However, I often find myself silently bemoaning my lack of social contact and my dwindling (to the point of nonexistence) social circle. I don't really have a social circle. And the only one responsible for this problem is myself. You have to make an effort to be in touch with others and get out and do things. So when my friend Mary (from high school) suggested I go to the Creative Cocktail Hour at Real Art Ways on Thursday night with her, I decided to go. I had no excuses: school's done for now so no homework and I had already planned to take Friday off so I was assured of the down time I so badly need / crave even if I wouldn't have any Thursday night.

Anyway, it was a good time. I found Mary who was sitting with a friend, this Irish guy she had told me about. She encouraged me to get some food. Since it was around 7 or so, most of the food was already gone, and I was quite hungry after weight training that afternoon and having no dinner. I got a couple small chunks of cheese, a dollop of hummus and some strawberries, and that tided me over. Next time I go, hopefully I will get a bit more for my $8 cover charge.

So we sat and talked and people watched. A fellow teacher of Mary's stopped by and they commiserated about the awful student she (the fellow teacher) has to tutor. The student got expelled for threatening to kill people at the school so now she gets one-on-one tutoring in the library. Yup, special treatment for being a trouble maker. What's worse for the teacher is that the student does NOT bathe, and she smells terrible. The teacher said, "She smells crotch-y." Totally gross, but I did have to laugh having never heard that adjective before.

There was a band playing outside and the Irish guy went out to listen and after a while Mary and I did too. I'm not much into rap and hip hop music, but this was African hip hop, and it had a great sound. The band's name is Gokh-Bi System and they were playing up a storm. A bunch of guests were dancing around in front of them. It was kind of funny to me because it was basically just a bunch of white ladies - no men, no people of color. The band was into it though. Sometimes they would alternate with one another and come out into the group of dancing people and sing or play. I didn't feel uninhibited enough to dance, but I kind of wanted to. Maybe next time...

Mary and I went back inside and checked out the gallery. Very abstract stuff, some of which was cool (Fay Ku) and some of which was just plain weird (Shaun Leonardo). In one room, there was a cardboard box propped on small block of wood in the corner, and at first I thought it was trash, but it was part of the exhibit. It had a piece of sparkly paper in it which cast some light on the wall. Some other people and I kind of shared a laugh about this piece of art. It was nice that there were people who were down to earth enough to get that it was a bit funny. I actually quite appreciate abstract art and I did like this piece, but at first I thought, "hey someone left some trash over here," and that was funny.

It was good to see Mary and it was definitely a big step for me to go out, and I thanked her for encouraging me to go. I think I will do it again.

Labels: friends, the world around us

posted by Miss Rachel 5/22/2007 09:16:00 PM

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I came home from work, and there on the end table was my mail where Sweetie had placed it: a pet supply store catalog, an envelope from my secondary school, and a really cool looking psychedelic envelope. I picked it up and exclaimed, "I got something from the Anti-Linear Brain girl!" Inside was a cool card with a nice message (in nice handwriting I might add) and two CDs of an episode of the Bob Dylan Theme Time Radio Hour show that she talks about on her blog. She wrote that she thought I might enjoy it, and I think she's right. Thanks Laura!!! You made my day!!!

Labels: blogging, friends

posted by Miss Rachel 4/25/2007 06:32:00 PM

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The Underminer

Yesterday I realized I had forgotten my yogurt so when GG and another coworker, K asked if I wanted to go to the cafeteria with them I said yes. We talked about various things, and on the way back I got to talking about school and mentioned that I was taking a class this summer, and K asked me what it was. I said I didn't know much about it, but it was about the role of research in the field. As we got off the elevator, GG, who had been silent up to this point, said, "Well it sounds as if you've got a really boring summer ahead of you." I was stunned and hurt so I just didn't look at him or say anything and headed back to my desk. He started to say something to the effect that he meant that to him it sounded boring and that a course about something-or-other would be interesting, but I just kept walking away.

So I sat down at my desk feeling kind of bad, and I started to doubt myself. Maybe I had talked too much? But, no K has often asked me about school, and she had actually asked me about the course. Then I started to feel as if I wanted to defend librarianship and explain how it was a really interesting profession and that GG and other people just don't understand it because they are jumping to conclusions from some outdated, negative stereotypes about librarians. Then I stopped myself, and just realized that I had had an encounter with The Underminer.*

No, he's not nearly as bad as the person in the story, but what he said was just plain mean. Later there was a quick department meeting when our new department manager was announced. GG sat down next to me, and after the meeting he said, "Three more weeks; just three more weeks till my vacation. I have to go shopping for some things for my trip..." Then I realized that he probably had wanted to talk about his vacation when we went to the cafeteria, but instead we talked about my school which wasn't of interest to him. So, he tried to undermine me.

So yeah, what he said hurt my feelings. I think he realized that what he said bothered me, but he's not the type of person to acknowledge that and say he's sorry, and I don't want to make myself vulnerable by saying anything so I'm just going to let it go, and realize that he's not always a Friend. When I talked to the psychic counselor a few weeks ago, she said I seemed to isolate myself at work. I knew this was true, and I thought I might have to defend my stance, but she said that there were a lot of negative people around me so it wasn't bad that I isolated myself.

*see Act 3

Labels: friends, library science, school

posted by Miss Rachel 4/03/2007 06:53:00 PM

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What Has Been Going On

I never seem to have enough time, and this week that seems to be moreso than ever. Get up, drink coffee, get ready for work, go to work, work, come home, eat dinner, make a phone call, clean up, take a shower, and it's 9 PM. Since I try to (and need to) go to bed around 10 - 10:30 PM, 9 PM is already getting pretty late. And I haven't even started this week's homework assignment.

This week got off to a messed up start partially because when I got back from class last Saturday, there was a message on my voice mail from a friend telling me she was in the looney bin. Forgive me for using that term, but my ex-husband is a schizophrenic and after having lived through the hell of his psychosis, I feel I've earned the right to use the term looney bin. The "looney bin" that she's at is one of the best, if you're going to be in a place like that. My ex-husband has been there a number of times, and I've visited him there.

Anyway, my friend asked me to call her so I did. She told me she tried to kill herself by overdosing. She lives alone, but I guess her kids were afraid something was up and one them ended up going to her apartment and found her. She's suffered from depression a lot during the time I've known her, but she's never been suicidal before so it was quite a shock to hear. I visited her on Sunday She's being released tomorrow and is going to participate in an out patient program that meets three days a week. I'm feeling fairly confident she's going to be all right, but she's scared about being alone and being back in her apartment which is in a very urban and not great neighborhood.

From a self-centered viewpoint, her situation really puts mine in perspective. Yes, I've been pretty depressed and negative lately and said things in my head like "maybe I should kill myself" but no way did I mean it. I realize I should just quit saying that kind of shit to myself because it's not healthy and it's not true, and I should be glad it's not.

Even before knowing what was going on with my friend, I had scheduled a phone session with psychic-counselor-healing practitioner late Sunday afternoon. Now I know some of you may be skeptical about that sort of thing, but I've spoken with this person before, and she's very insightful and she gives good practical advice.

So, I'm going to get plants for my cubicle at work, I may go back on antidepressants (I went off them in mid December) or try Sam-E, a natural alternative she recommends, try to exercise more, and I may continue my Slow Path to Success method of grad school instead of stepping up the pace next fall because, as she said, I need a lot of down time. Now I know this, but it helped hearing her say it as just as a fact about me because I start to think that maybe I'm lazy because other people in the program work full time and take two classes at a time. But hey, maybe that pace is not for me, and that's all right.

In fact, lack of down time is what got me into the sitaution I'm in now: Wednesday night with no homework done and it's almost bedtime. I left a lot of chores for Sunday and then combined with visiting my friend, the week took off running and here I am now feeling as if I can barely keep up.

Labels: friends, life at home, school, the blues

posted by Miss Rachel 2/28/2007 09:16:00 PM

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